Canelo returns to PBC on 1-fight deal, faces Munguia on May 4

Mexican superstar defends undisputed super middleweight title

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Undisputed super middleweight champion Canelo Alvarez, boxing’s biggest star, will defend all four 168-pound titles against Mexican countryman Jaime Munguia on May 4 — Cinco de Mayo weekend — at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, the fighters announced on Friday night on social media.

“Mexico vs. Mexico — May 4th Las Vegas,” Alvarez posted with a photo of the artwork for the event.

The fight puts Alvarez back in business with Al Haymon’s Premier Boxing Champions on a one-fight deal barely a week after they split and Alvarez negotiated with at least two other platforms, sources told Fight Freaks Unite.

Alvarez had signed a three-fight deal with PBC in June but completed only one bout, a one-sided decision win against then-undisputed junior middleweight champion Jermell Charlo in September, also at T-Mobile Arena.

When it came time to put together fight No. 2 for May, they were not able to agree on an opponent or the guaranteed purse for the fight, sources with knowledge of the details told Fight Freaks Unite.

The contract specified two PBC opponents, WBC middleweight titlist Jermall Charlo (Jermell’s twin brother) and now-former unified welterweight champion Errol Spence Jr., and guaranteed purses for each. However, both had lost their viability as pay-per-view opponents since the deal was signed last summer and Haymon wanted to change the terms of the deal, including wanting Alvarez to agree to fight unbeaten WBC interim titlist and obvious No. 1 contender David Benavidez in September, sources said.

Unable to come to terms, Alvarez had the right to seek other offers, one source said, and they briefly parted ways. During the time apart, Alvarez negotiated a possible return to Matchroom Boxing Promoter Eddie Hearn and DAZN for fights in May and September, with Munguia and unbeaten contender Edgar Berlanga on the short list as opponents, and there was also a third platform that engaged Alvarez’s team in serious discussions, sources said.

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In the end, Haymon and Alvarez were able to make a new one-fight deal that will pay Alvarez a guaranteed purse of “north of $35 million,” a source with direct knowledge of the details said.

The deal will give PBC a significant pay-per-view fight for Amazon Prime Video, its new media partner following the shuttering of Showtime Sports in December, something it needed with the only other card on its schedule so far being an Amazon Prime Video pay-per-view event headlined by a nontitle fight between Keith Thurman and Tim Tszyu on March 30, also at T-Mobile Arena.

However, the fight will not be exclusive to Amazon Prime Video. DAZN, which has a contract with Munguia co-promoter Golden Boy Promotions for content, will also serve as a distributor of the PBC-produced event, as will PPV.com, sources said.

According to the artwork Alvarez posted, and confirmed by sources, Canelo Promotions is the promoter of the event. Golden Boy, Alvarez’s former promoter, with whom he now has an adversarial relationship, is not a co-promoter of the event, though it remains Munguia’s co-promoter with Zanfer Promotions, sources said.

Alvarez has said he prefers not to fight Mexican countrymen but agreed to fight Munguia. Alvarez has not faced a Mexican since he shut out Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. in a nontitle fight at 164 pounds in May 2017, also at T-Mobile Arena, where Alvarez will be fighting for the ninth time. He opened the building for boxing with a massive knockout of Amir Khan in a 2016 headliner.

Former WBO junior middleweight titlist Munguia (43-0, 34 KOs), 27, spent 2021 and 2022 facing a series of no-hopers in middleweight mismatches before moving up to super middleweight. In his lone fight of 2023, Munguia narrowly outpointed former three-time middleweight world title challenger Sergiy Derevyanchenko, who was also moving in weight, in The Ring magazine fight of the year and the Fight Freaks Unite fight of the year runner-up.

In Munguia’s next fight, in January in Phoenix, he went into his first bout under the guidance of Hall of Fame trainer Freddie Roach and knocked John Ryder down four times en route to a ninth-round knockout and sent him into retirement.

The fight was seen as a way to compare Munguia and four-division champion Alvarez (60-2-2, 39 KOs), 33, because he defended the undisputed title against Ryder last May and although he knocked him down once, he could not stop him in a lopsided decision win in a Guadalajara, Mexico, homecoming fight.

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